Hey everyone. Welcome back to the Daily gospel
exegesis podcast. We're all about helping.
You understand the Gospel reading from today's mass.
So we're really doing a deep dive into the text.
What did it mean in its original context?
How can we understand the words that are used?
What's Jesus up to In this passage?
So really doing a proper verse by verse and What's this of the
text? And at today's mass, you'll hear
this passage from Luke chapter 9, verses 51 to 62.
As the time Drew near for him to be taken up to heaven, Jesus
resolutely took the road for Jerusalem and sent Messengers
ahead of him. These set out and they went into
a Samaritan Village to make preparations for him.
But the people would not receive him because he was making for
Jerusalem. Seeing this, the disciples
James. And John said, Lord do you want
us to call down fire from heaven to burn them up?
But he turned and rebuked them and they went off to another
Village. As Jesus and his disciples
traveled along. They met a man on the road who
said to him I will follow you wherever you go.
Jesus answered. Foxes have holes and the birds
of the air have nests but the son of man has nowhere to lay
his head. Another to whom he said, follow
me replied, let me go and bury my father first but he answered
leave the dead to bury their dead.
Your duty is to go and spread the news of the kingdom of God.
Another said, I will follow you sir.
But first, let me go and say goodbye to my people at home.
Jesus said to him once the hand is laid on the plow.
No one who looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.
So that's a short passage today. Bit of an interesting one.
Let's start by thinking about the context, so Jesus has been
doing ministry in Galilee and he's been teaching his disciples
about important matters. A whole series of different
things before setting out for Jerusalem and now we get to a
very significant verse in Luke's gospel, which marks quite a big
transition. So, verse 51 as the time Drew
near for him to be taken up to heaven.
Now, what it actually says The the word Heaven is not in the
original. All it says is when the days
Drew near for him to be received up.
Now, we probably think of the Ascension when we hear that, as
in Jesus ascending to heaven. And that's certainly in view,
but it seems that the way Luke uses this term to be received
up, would include Jesus, passion, death, resurrection and
Ascension. So Jesus knows that his time for
all those things to happen is coming soon.
It's Drawing Near. And in fact that's the whole
purpose of his life is to die and then rise again.
And Jesus knowing the future knows that that is coming up.
Maybe the term taken up here is supposed to make readers think
of how Elijah and Moses were both taken up to heaven.
Because Jesus, if you think about it, he's just seen Moses
and Elijah at the Transfiguration and Luke's
readers certainly would have been familiar with Moses and
Elijah stories about how they were taken up at the end of
their life. So maybe Luke here is
deliberately making a parallel between Moses and Elijah and
Jesus. That's certainly possible.
Luke says Jesus resolutely took the road for Jerusalem or what
it actually says there literally is.
He set his face to go to Jerusalem.
So Luke tells us that from this point on, Jesus is determined to
go to Jerusalem. This is his goal for the next
section of his ministry. Now, there is a lot that still
happens. We're only in Luke chapter 9,
and it's not till about Luke chapter 19 or 20 that he gets to
Jerusalem. So there's a lot that happens
before then. But Luke tells us, this is the
Which basically, Jesus Galilean Ministry is finished, and he's
now turning his attention to Jerusalem.
That's his next goal. It seems that Luke is
deliberately describing Jesus attitude.
This way to highlight certain things.
So, what it says here in the Greek is he set his face to go
to Jerusalem? Well, similar things are said
about Ezekiel and Jeremiah on their mission to preach against
Jerusalem. So in Jeremiah 21 verse 10 and
then Ezekiel one verse to both of them when they're talking
about the mission that Jeremiah and Ezekiel are about to go on.
God uses this phrase, set your face towards Jerusalem, so it's
interesting. Jesus is doing the same thing
here and interestingly both of them predict Jerusalem's
destruction Ezekiel. And Jeremiah when they go to
Jerusalem, they condemn Jerusalem and they predict that
it's going to be destroyed. Well, that's basically what
Jesus does when he finally gets to Jerusalem as well.
There's another explanation though, which is maybe it's
supposed to recall the third Servant Song of Isaiah.
So, in Isaiah chapter 50 verse 7.
It says, and this is Isaiah speaking.
I have set my face, like a flint knowing that I shall not be put
to shame. So, maybe one of those passages
from the great prophets, is what Luke has in mind here when he's
drawing a parallel with Jesus, Now, this begins What's called
the travel narrative and Luke. So this next part of Luke's
gospel is collectively called the travel narrative or
sometimes called the ministry to Judea and perea.
And that actually takes up about 40% of Luke's gospel.
So here, in Luke 9:51, we're starting a new big section of
Luke that takes up 40% of Luke's gospel, and it will take us
quite a few weeks to get through this travel narrative.
Basically, for the next 10 chapters Jesus is going to be on
the way to Jerusalem. And everything that happens in
the next ten, chapters is on the road to Jerusalem.
So he's traveling if you look at a map he's traveling from
Galilee in the north to Judea in the South where Jerusalem is.
And there's a region between Galilee and Judea and that
region is called Samaria where the Samaritans live and that's
not actually a Jewish territory the people that live there.
The Samaritans are not really Jewish.
The Samaritans did not like the Jews and the Jews did not like
the Samaritans, interestingly there's a Lot of material in
these next. Ten chapters that are unique to
look. Matthew and Mark, only have
about one chapter on this entire period of heading towards
Jerusalem, but Luke has 10 chapters.
So we're going to see a lot of interesting stuff here in the
coming chapters that you won't hear in any of the other
gospels. So, Luke tells us in verse 52,
he sent Messengers ahead of him. So it looks like, what's going
on here that? Well, there's two possible
explanations. Jesus knows what direction he's
going. He knows what towns he wants to
go into. And it looks like he wants
certain towns. Particularly non-jewish ones to
hear the gospel at least once before he arrives.
And remember, he's already done this a couple of times.
He's already sent the disciples out on Mission and now it's kind
of a similar thing again. He's sending Messengers ahead of
him to these towns maybe so that these challenges are more
prepared to receive it when he does arrive.
And that makes sense. Because these Samaritan towns,
particularly probably don't know a lot about the kingdom of God
because they don't have the same Old Testament as the Jews.
Ooh, so they probably need more information before Jesus
arrived. So, Jesus, in an act of
compassion, is planning to send some messages there to the
Samaritan town so that they're more prepared when he, when he
himself arrives. So, in a sense, he of these
Messengers, probably some of the Twelve Apostles, they're
continuing the message of John the Baptist.
If you look at 7:27 of Luke, you talks about John the Baptist
being sent before Jesus face to prepare people for Jesus.
This message. So that's what these Messengers
are doing. Now, the John, the Baptist is
gone now, more literally, it actually says here, he sent
Messengers before his face. So again, this language of face
is being echoed. Their these set out and went
into a Samaritan Village. Now, this makes sense, because,
as we said before, Samaria would be the main region.
They're traveling through to get to Jerusalem.
Interestingly most Jews would not travel through Samaria.
They were deliberately go. The long way around to avoid
going through Samaria because the Jews did not.
Like the Samaritans, the Samaritans did not like the Jews
and there's some historical reasons for that which we've
talked about in other episodes. But basically, it comes down to
in the Old Testament, there's a period where the people in
Samaria, intermixed with Gentile races and they ended up
worshipping false idols. And you can see that in Second
Kings 17 verse 24. So the resulting offspring, and
now called Samaritans in the time of Jesus and they're kind
of considered to be not proper Jews by the Jews of Galilee and
Judea because the Samaritans don't have the same worship
practices but Jesus in this case has no problem with going sus
through Samaria he wants the Samaritans to hear the gospel to
so these set out and they went into a Samaritan Village to make
preparations for him. So as we said earlier, maybe the
reason Jesus sends Messengers is for theological reasons to get
them ready for the Theology of the kingdom of God.
But it could also be that he's just sending Messengers out to
find a place for him to stay. He's kind of looking for a spot
where they can all stay in this. Samaritan Village verse 53 but
the people would not receive him because he was making for
Jerusalem. And again, what it literally
says he is because his Swissair towards Jerusalem.
So it seems the Samaritans in this town.
They don't approve of someone staying in their Village.
If this person is just using it as a pit stop on the way to
Jerusalem. They're not okay with that
because the Samaritans worshipped on Mount gerizim,
they believe that was the true place of worship and so Jews,
who insisted on Jerusalem, being the proper place of worship.
They did not appreciate that. Also, when Jews came along and
said we're going to Jerusalem, they weren't happy about it.
So in this case, this town of Samaritans decides, we're not
going to let this man stay here now, obviously, they don't
realize is the Messiah. They just think is another do on
his way to Jerusalem, so they don't let him stay there.
It's an interesting example, isn't it?
It's an entire Village who collectively doesn't let Jesus
come in, they reject Jesus. That's exactly what Nazareth did
in Luke chapter 4, at the start of the Galilean Ministry.
Jesus was rejected by Nazareth and here we have at the start of
what we could call the Judy. History, a town rejecting Jesus
again. So maybe Luke is placed these
incidents at the start of the two sections to make a point,
which is that no matter where Jesus goes, he's always met with
resistance verse 54 seeing this, the disciples James, and John.
So, these are the fishermen sons of Zebedee and their part of
Jesus, in a circle, they know Jesus very well and they
actually get the nicknames sons of thunder.
And you can see that in Mark chapter 3 there called sons of
thunder. Why are they called that?
Well, we're not given an explanation but it's probably
because of their boldness. And we're going to see that in
this very next verse, we're going to see why there while
they're known as being bold. So seeing this, the disciples
James and John. They're not happy that the town
is rejected, Jesus, and they're trying to protect him.
So they say, Lord, do you want us to call down fire from heaven
to burn them up? Now, we see, this is ridiculous,
but we need to keep a few things in mind here, particularly the
Old Testament context, James, and John by now.
Realize that they he's anointed Apostle.
So they do have genuine power, they get to share in Jesus power
and Mission. So they believe that the
appropriate response for towns who reject the message of the
kingdom and particularly those who outright reject their Master
Jesus, they think the best thing to happen in that case is for
the village to be punished by God.
So these people James and John, they have genuine Zeal for the
message of the Kingdom, but of course, they lack of Mercy.
Now, there's more to it, those some manuscripts here, actually
say a bit more, they say, Lord, do you want us to call down,
fire from heaven, to burn them up as Elijah did.
Now, that would make sense if that's the correct reading.
Because in the Old Testament, there is an incident where
Elijah calls down fire from heaven.
Not probably not the incident. You're thinking of where the
sacrifice is burned up. When the other Pagan priests are
around. We're all familiar with that
one, but this is actually a different story.
Logical is down, fire from heaven, to consume Messengers
that are sent from the king of Samaria.
So, the king of Samaria sends Messengers and a larger calls
down fire from heaven. That's in Second Kings one.
So, given that maybe James and John here, see themselves in a
parallel position. Maybe they think of Elijah in
terms of the way he was preaching the kingdom of God in
his own day and they them self. And now preaching the fullness
of the kingdom of God and given that Elijah can call down.
Fire from heaven, and it makes sense for them to be able to
call down fire from heaven on those that reject the kingdom
and maybe they see themselves as particularly continuing in the
role of John, the Baptist John, the Baptist is dead now but John
the Baptist was known as being in the spirit and power of
Elijah. Luke chapter one, specifically
said that so maybe James and John say, well, John the Baptist
is gone. He was the one who represented
Elijah. Maybe we should take on the
role. Now of representing Elijah,
there's a whole theme of Elijah running through this section.
Which is interesting because Elijah did just show up at the
Transfiguration, so maybe Luke is highlighting that.
Now, what's interesting about this, when they sail, or do you
want us to call down, fire from heaven, Jesus doesn't deny that
they have the power to do that. Now, if you think about it,
Jesus himself would have had that power because he's Jesus
and given that the apostles do have a share in Jesus, divine
power, certainly we know that they able to do healings and
exorcisms as a result of the special share of power, they get
from Jesus, Maybe it's reasonable to think that they
could actually call down fire from heaven.
It's possible that they could do that.
If they wanted to, but verse 55, Jesus turned and rebuked them.
So, Jesus determines that in this case, it's not appropriate
to call down fire from heaven. Not that the town isn't worthy
of judgment necessarily. In fact, in chapter 10, in the
next chapter, Jesus gives warnings to towns for rejecting
him, that's in chapter 10, verses 10 to 11.
So it's acceptable for For the town's to be warned.
But he says that in this case, it's not acceptable for the town
to be destroyed. This is not the time for
Destruction. So Jesus doesn't want to give
the wrong impression of what his mission is about.
It's not about destruction. He makes clear through his
Parables. That one day, there will be a
judgment where villages will be judged.
Remember all the passages where Jesus says it will be more
tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah on these days than for
Capernaum. So he does actually say that one
day Villages that reject him will.
Be judged, but he's clear through his Parables that that's
in the future, not while he's on Earth.
So once again here the disciples have misunderstood the nature of
Jesus mission. As they often do Jesus is going
to soon, teach them to help. Make it clear.
He's going to teach you societal.
Ills, that they need to love and extend Mercy to their enemies
and that would include the Samaritans.
So if you look later in chapter 10, that's exactly what he's
going to say. Now, some manuscripts, you have
an extra part. So it says here, Jesus turned
and rebuked them. And then some manuscripts, add,
you do not know what manner of spirit you are for the son of
man came not to destroy men's lives, but to save them.
This is an interesting saying of Jesus, which we often forget
about. Now it may not have been in the
original, so there's a lot of textual dispute about is this
supposed to be in there or not? But it's an interesting saying
of Jesus. The son of man came not to
destroy men's lives. Lives.
But to save them. So this certainly adds further
support to what we just said, Jesus doesn't want the village
to be destroyed yet because while he's still alive and in
fact, while the kingdom is still expanding any time before the
consummation. So, including now Jesus says he
wants people's lives to be saved.
Not destroyed. So, Jesus wants to ensure
basically that the maximum number of people come to
repentance that seemed to be what he's saying.
And if you think about it, if people are killed or destroyed
Freud is the word Jesus uses here.
Then there's no chance for them to repent and Jesus would much
prefer that they repent rather than just being killed.
So that's what Jesus is all about.
Particularly during his Earthly Ministry, he wants to make sure
that the maximum number of people can repent.
So this leads to a possible. Interesting argument.
That could be made against capital punishment because here,
if this was indeed part of the original manuscript and of
course that's disputed. But if it was part of the
original manuscript Jesus, he says I've come not Destroy men's
lives, but to save them. And that seems to mean, Jesus
would much prefer that people live and have time to repent
rather than just killing them for doing the wrong thing.
Well, that seems to be a pretty strong argument against capital
punishment. Now obviously there's a lot more
that could be said here and certainly the case is, are not
exactly the same because In this passage the punishment is
because they have outright rejected, the message of the
Kingdom. They've rejected Jesus himself,
whereas in the case of capital punishment, its civil
governments punishing In some sort of civil crime.
But still there's an interesting theology going on here and it
is, of course, going to come down to whether it was part of
the original manuscript or not. And that will be up to biblical
Scholars, to, determine certainly one of the places that
we should keep an eye on in the coming years because it might be
something that biblical scholarship can resolve for us.
Was this phrase in the original or not?
So, verse 56 is the final verse and they went on to another
Village and presumably, they're going to a different Samaritan
Village, net and nearby one. Jesus would later show Mercy
towards Samaritans and in fact, he's going to praise some
Samaritan. So this is not the last time we
hear about the Samaritans in chapter 10, he Praises them.
And then again in chapter 17 we have Samaritans presented in a
positive light. And of course, in the book of
Acts, many Samaritans do come to Faith, they accept Jesus rather
than reject him. In fact, the Greek word there is
the opposite of what we see here.
They do not welcome. Jesus in today's passage, but in
The book of Acts, they welcomed the message of the Kingdom.
So the Samaritans themself go through a bit of a conversion in
terms of the kingdom of God, as Jesus and his disciples traveled
along. So they're going From Galilee
down to Jerusalem and there on the road, the probably in the
region of Samaria here or near near there anyway, because
that's where they were in the previous passage.
So they're moving towards Jerusalem and we're going to see
here, Jesus, having similar encounters with three different
People on the road. Now this probably didn't occur
on the same day, these are probably three different
encounters Jesus had but because they cover similar topics.
Luke has a group them all together.
In the same story. It says they met a man on the
road who said to Jesus, I will follow you wherever you go.
So this man is genuinely interested in Jesus, and he
wants to be a full-time follower.
He says, I will follow you wherever you go verse 58 now.
Jesus probably perceive. It's his thoughts here, and this
is what he says. It's an interesting little
Jewish analogy. Foxes have holes and the birds
of the air have nests, but the son of man has nowhere to lay
his head. So the point of this little
allegory is something like this animals have homes, but I live a
difficult itinerant life on the road and I don't have a
permanent place to sleep. That's the point he's making and
the implication is that the man wasn't prepared to live.
A rough itinerant life that Jesus and the apostles live and
Jesus knew that. And that's why he said that
little analogy that little metaphor.
So that the man knows if you sign up to do This you're going
to have to leave pretty rough. That's all there is to the
episode. We don't get to find out what
the man said or thought about that.
Many scholars have pointed out that this is a clear passage
though, where Jesus does not preach a Prosperity Gospel.
He doesn't say, come with me, and you'll have a great life.
He says the actual opposite here, and that's quite an issue.
An interesting point verse 59, another to whom he said, follow
me. So, this is a second person.
Probably much later on. Jesus Takes the initiative with
the second person. He says, follow me, he wants
this person to follow him now. Even that is pretty remarkable.
Because in that culture, you Only the followers chose the
rabbi not the other way around. Jesus here is choosing people
that he wants to follow him and that in itself is pretty
radical. Here's what the person says
though, let me go and bury my father first.
Now, bearing relatives was a sacred Duty in Judaism, you did
need to bury your relatives, you are obliged to do that.
You can see that in Exodus chapter 20, it's an extension of
the commandment to honor your mother and father and also also
in Tobit, Chapter 4 verses Three to four, which is in Catholic
Bibles. There's some passages in there
about the importance of looking, after your parents in their old
age and burying them when they die.
So the man here is basically saying, once my father has
passed away and I have taken care of that, then I can devote
myself to following Jesus for time now.
It seems unlikely that the Man's father has died yet because
otherwise, the man will probably be at home helping with the
burial, but it seems like he His father will pass away soon.
Alternatively, some Scholars have looked at this and thought
that it means something a little different.
Maybe when the man says, let me go and bury my father, first
maybe that's a Jewish way of saying, I need to take care of
my aging father until he dies and in that case is not
envisioning that his father will die anytime soon.
It's just a way of saying, I need to look after my old
father. Now, if that's what the man
means, it's more of an excuse, his saying this, as a way of
getting out of following Jesus and it's would give him in the
Indefinite Delay from following Jesus.
So it's quite an effective excuse.
If it's true verse 60, Jesus answered.
Leave the dead to bury their dead.
Pretty strong words, there or leave the dead to bury their own
dead. There's probably a better
translation there. Now, to understand this thing
that Jesus is saying, we need to understand the different ways
that Jesus is using dead. In this single sentence, the
word dead appears twice, but Jesus uses it to mean two
different things in the same sentence.
It's actually quite a clever. Rephrase basically, when he
says, Let the dead bury their own dead, he's basically saying
let those who are spiritually dead bury their dead, and the
spiritually dead would be those who are not following him.
In other words, in this case, the rest of the Man's family are
not Believers. So they're spiritually dead.
And Jesus says, well, they can bury his father when he dies
rather than this man, this man is needed here in proclaiming
the gospel. Some have thought there might
also be a reference here when Jesus Calls the rest of the
Man's family. The dead, maybe he's considering
all of Israel is dead because he knows that there's an impending
judgment coming on Israel. In 70 AD elsewhere in Luke Jesus
talks about how he knows that Israel will soon be destroyed.
So, Luke 13 verse 35, and Luke 19 verse 41 to 44.
It's this idea that the Jews as a whole, would soon be dead in
quotation marks. Not All of them, but a large
portion of them would be wiped out.
So, maybe that's behind Jesus reasoning here.
I think the best explanation, that would be to say that he's
thinking of dead to mean, spiritually, dead at those who
are not following him. Now, this is pretty radical,
he's saying to the men, no, don't go and bury your dad.
Come with me instead at that time.
Only. There was only a small group of
Jews who were not obliged to bury their parents and that was
a group called The nazarites they were basically consecrated
juice. It's kind of, like, monks they
were exempt from the obligation to bury their parents.
We see that in Numbers chapter 6 in particular, the fact that
Jesus says to this man who is not a Nazarite apparently, he
says no, don't bury your dead, come with me.
That indicates the extraordinary importance of, Christ's call to
discipleship. During his ministry, his
followers are called to be set apart in quite a radical way to
serve in God's Kingdom. Now Jesus is not undermining the
propriety of burial, but his using what the man said as a
stepping stone to illustrate the higher demands of the Christian
Life. Indeed, the church actually
considers burial. A Corporal Works of Mercy.
If you look at the catechism paragraph, 2447 it's pretty
clear that burying the dead is a good thing and Jesus is not
teaching here that you shouldn't bury your dead.
He clarifies it with this second half of the sentence.
He says, your duty is to go and spread the news of the kingdom
of God. So this man that he speaking to
is a Believer, so that man should have a higher priority,
which is to serve the kingdom of God by following Jesus, and
spreading the message. The Kingdom.
So here, as in other places, Jesus emphasizes the allegiance
that allegiance to him takes priority, even over family
bonds. That's actually a pretty common
teaching of Jesus in the gospels.
So, if this man who is a Believer already were to choose
his family, over his obligation, to preach, the kingdom.
That will be quite serious. You'll be avoiding quite a
serious obligation. We need to keep in mind that
Jesus is thinking particularly of the time period of his own
Ministry while he's He's walking the Earth and we'll talk more
about that as we come to the last couple of verses here.
Verse 61, another person said I will follow you sir or I Will
Follow You Lord. So here comes a man who
acknowledges that Jesus should be followed and he intends to
do. So he says I will follow you.
But first let me go and say goodbye to my people at home.
So this man is thinking logically, he knows that he's
going to be gone for some time when he follows Jesus around.
So he wants the opportunity. You to say goodbye to his people
first, and that's actually a fairly reasonable request.
In fact, if you look at 1 Kings, chapter 19, verse 20, when
Elijah called Alicia Alicia, said the exact same thing.
He said, let me go and say goodbye to my parents first.
And interestingly, at the time Alicia was plowing and the
plowing thing is going to be quite important in the next
verse and Elijah actually, let's Alicia go and do that, but here
Jesus is. Greater than Elijah.
So Jesus doesn't allow well as far as we know, he doesn't allow
the man to go and say goodbye to his parents and that in itself
is an indication of how much greater Jesus is than Elijah and
certainly many of Luke's readers would have had the incident from
1 Kings, 19 with Elijah and Elisha at the front of their
minds. They heard this man say this so
he says let me go and say goodbye to my people at home.
The issue here is that Jesus doesn't have time to hang around
and wait. For this one man to go to his
parents and then come back. Jesus has to keep moving.
There isn't time for that particularly because Jesus is
getting towards the end of his ministry now.
So it's not that he doesn't think the man should be given an
opportunity to say goodbye to his parents in general, that
will be okay. It's just that Jesus has an
urgency of his mission at this point.
So given the context he says it would not be okay for the man to
go back and do that verse 62. Here's what he says about this.
Man, once the hand is laid on the plow, no one who looks back
is fit for the kingdom of God, a better translation of this would
be no one who puts his hand to the plow, and looks back is fit
for the kingdom of God. So this is an agricultural
metaphor in that culture. A plow was a device that was
used to gather grain. Once someone had set themselves
up on the plow, they would put their hand on the plow and then
start pushing it. They'd start moving forward and
they would concentrate on moving forward.
I'm watching what they were doing.
If the person got distracted and they looked behind them, then
they won't do a very good job of plowing.
The player won't come out straight because they're not
concentrating. So it's actually quite a good
metaphor for serving in the kingdom of God.
So, Jesus is saying that during his lifetime, only Those who
commit themselves fully to following him and serving the
kingdom of God are worthy of the Kingdom.
So people in that time period, while Jesus is Alive, people
cannot follow him half Heartedly or get distracted by other
things in their life, if they're going to follow Jesus, they need
to do it properly. That's Jesus teaching here.
You cannot, do it. Half-heartedly otherwise it's
not going to work. These last couple of individuals
that people that Jesus meets here, both you want to go and
say goodbye to their family. We shouldn't we should be
careful how we interpret this. It's probably not supposed to be
a principle that applies to all times, and all people Jesus is
talking in particular about his own Earthly Ministry, while
Jesus is alive, and walking the Earth, those who feel called to
follow him, have to do that. He's only going to be with them
for a short time. That does not mean that in all
times. Christian Believers should
neglect their parents or families.
Clearly, Jesus does not want that he's thinking, particularly
of, when he's alive. So, in each of the three people
we've seen in each of, the three cases.
The individuals are unnamed. Jesus calls all of them to
follow him. All three of them faced some
sort of mental reservation and in all three cases, we don't
find out the outcome. We don't know what happened to
them. Luke might have deliberately
Sort of written it this way, or focused on it in this way.
So that his own readers could reflect on their own lives and
priorities, in terms of the kingdom.
And certainly there's lessons here for us as well in terms of
how we prioritize the kingdom. So let's finish the today with
two quick, catechism references which linked to Luke chapter 9.
So, paragraph 557, this is the catechism describing Jesus
journey to Jerusalem when the days Drew near for him to be
taken up Jesus, set his face to go to Jerusalem by this
decision. He indicated that he was going
up to Jerusalem, prepare to die there, three times.
He had announced his passion and Resurrection.
Now heading towards Jerusalem, Jesus says, it cannot.
Be that a prophet should perish away from Jerusalem.
So here you see the catechism linking up a few different
passages, which talk about Jesus decision to go to Jerusalem and
of course a key one of that is from Luke chapter 9 here and
then a short one about Jesus, our own experience in paragraph.
Five, for for Jesus shares. The life of the poor from the
cradle to the Cross. He experiences hunger thirst and
privation. And we certainly see that In
this passage here when he says, I have nowhere to lay my head,
he's actually quite a poor person for most of his life.
And thanks for listening today. I hope you have learned
something new. It's a bit of a longer passage
today but we're beginning. Quite a significant section in
the Gospel of Luke. Hopefully, you'll tune in again
tomorrow.